Accidentally Successful Searching: Users' Perceptions of a Digital Library

Sanna W. Kumpulainen, Heli Kautonen

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionScientificpeer-review

    5 Citations (Scopus)
    99 Downloads (Pure)

    Abstract

    People usually search information by using queries that are targeted to match the wording of the documents in the collections. However, during their search processes they may discover some useful pieces of information they did not expect. Serendipitous searching occurs when people search for information, but during their search process discover unexpected results. One key aspect of serendipity is chance encountering, which means the accidental and unexpected encountering with useful information. In this paper we address to the chance encounters, search success and search interests of information seekers using a national digital library called Finna. This study shows that chance encountering and search success increase with user satisfaction and that digital libraries can support information encountering.
    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationProceedings of the 2017 Conference on Conference Human Information Interaction and Retrieval
    Place of PublicationNew York, NY, USA
    PublisherACM
    Pages257-260
    Number of pages4
    ISBN (Print)978-1-4503-4677-1
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2017
    Publication typeA4 Article in conference proceedings
    EventConference on Human Information Interaction and Retrieval -
    Duration: 1 Jan 2020 → …

    Conference

    ConferenceConference on Human Information Interaction and Retrieval
    Period1/01/20 → …

    Keywords

    • chance encounters
    • chance encounters, information encountering, user satisfaction, user survey
    • information searching

    Publication forum classification

    • Publication forum level 1

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